Which is why there will be no alternative content for those who hate Apple Macintosh... or just don't care about Apple Macintosh... or are tired of reading about Apple Macintosh. Today at Blogography is all about Apple Macintosh and Steve Job's keynote speech at Macworld. Sorry about that.

Unless you love Apple Macintosh like I do, in which case today is your lucky day! Here's my thoughts on some of the announcements from this morning...

MacBook Air
So sexy it hurts to look at, the slender form-factor, astounding 5-hour battery life, and miniscule weight of the MacBook Air are almost too good to be true for the frequent traveler. The minute Steve Jobs took it out of that envelope, I wanted it... and wanted it bad. But then, just as I was about to click the "PRE-ORDER NOW" button, a few things started bouncing around my in my head...

Battery. Not user replaceable so, if you have a very long day of travel ahead of you, there's no way to carry along a spare. On top of that, batteries start going bad after a few months and, once a year or two has passed, the charge it can hold starts a steady decline. I don't like the idea of having to send my laptop back to Apple just to replace the battery.

Firewire. The lack of a Firewire port means no movie editing, and I'm shocked that Apple would omit it. This is almost a deal-breaker for me.

Glossy. I don't like glossy screens on my computers... not only does the glare make it difficult to use under anything less than optimized lighting conditions, but the hyper-bright colors are not conducive to color-accurate editing for designers.

Drive. The 80 GB hard drive is a little small compared to the 150 GB I'm used to, but it's the even smaller 64 GB SOLID STATE drive that I covet beyond all reason. Despite adding a cool $1000 to the cost of the MacBook Air, I'm guessing the speed and power savings it offers would be worth the sacrifice (I'll just take a tiny USB hard drive with me when I need the extra storage space for work files). This is both a negative and a positive.

So, despite my lust for this terrific new laptop, I'm not ordering one until I've seen it in person. Of course, being the Certified Mac Whore that I am, it's inevitable that the MacBook Air will eventually be mine. It's just too perfect for travel and, given the amount of traveling I do, it's easy to justify the purchase.

iPhone 3 Update...
My biggest complaint about iPhone since day one was the lack of a GPS unit to pinpoint my position on Google Maps. I thought this was a truly stupid oversight, and I hated having to figure out where I'm at so I can type it in for directions and such. Well, thanks to Google Maps's new ability to use cellular towers to triangulate position, iPhone now has a kind of "pseudo-GPS" which is accurate enough for me. The other new features are cool, but now I'm most excited about the 3rd-party developer kit Apple is releasing in February. Given the massive success of the iPhone, I'm betting that we're going to see some great new iPhone apps in the coming months. I can't wait.

Time Capsule...
This brilliant device allows wireless backup via Apple's ass-saving "Time Machine" technology, PLUS has a wireless base station built-in, PLUS allows a network volume share... all with an industrial server-level hard drive. The best feature though? The price. Just $499 for a Time Capsule unit with a full terabyte of storage space. I ordered one immediately.

AppleTV, Take 2...
I held off buying the original AppleTV when it first came out... it sounded great, but was lacking in several areas. Well, many of those holes have been filled with the new version two, and now I find myself wanting one. The deciding factor will be how many movies Apple puts up for rental. Something tells me that the studios are just going to LOVE that most of the rental fee paid will be going directly to them instead of some third party (like Blockbuster or NetFlix). If this is the case, and movie studios start putting their entire catalog up for rental (not just new releases and popular favorites) then I'll be giving AppleTV a serious look. This could be the ultimate "movies on demand" appliance, and I am in love with the idea of having immediate access to a massive repository of movies.

Or whatever.

Theoretically, this was a very expensive Macworld for me. It is likely that I'll end up buying every new product that was released, and that is not okay. I wish that Apple would release some total crap every once in a while so I could hang on to my hard-earned money.

*sigh* I’m starting to swing to the darkside. Maybe. That would, obviously be the macside. Even though I am a designer, and work in an office with both options available to me, I’m also a coder too, and don’t like working on a mac when I’m doing web 2.0 programming.

Okay, so I’m weird. Nothing new there.

But, I really like the new laptop. Except, I agree with everything you mention. Especially the non-user removable battery. C’mon Apple. It’s fine to send in an iPod, but there’s NO WAY I’ll be sending in my coveted laptop to service a battery! That’s crazy talk.

I’m looking forward to the next gen iPhone… I love my touch, which is all that we Canadians can really use right now. That, and I like the 16 GB of memory on the touch, too.

I love Macs too, but I can’t use them for my work, and the Windows doohicky to run on them is too slow.

I was all excited too, until I watched the presentation and it was really lacking. I was expecting some kind of really beefed-up machine with more cool stuff.

I also want the movie thingy. That’s pretty cool. But is that GPS thingy a seperate entity? Let’s face it:

1. First, we had to buy an ipod for our music (or mp3 player if you are like me and use napster now instead of ITunes).
2. Then, we had to buy Ipod with video.
3. Then, since we all had so many gadgets, we had to get Iphones so we could have everything in one place.
4. Now, we have to get a seperate GPS thingy.
5. Oh, and I forgot the real number 1: the IMac when it first came out, with no tower.

They are pumping the new technology out so fast that we end up buying the latest and greatest, and then replace it in six months. I just wish they would wait a little longer and release with really cool stuff instead of releasing latest and greatest every six…No wonder they are making money hand over fist.

I want an IPhone. Once I get my next job established, I am going to get one. I HATE my BB. The web looks like total crap on it.

I love the thinness of the airbook, the 3 pounds of it all, but he said the 60gb drive is really expensive.

I want it all. I want everything, and I mean, everything in one place.

And, I want the mac to flip over so it becomes a tablet like a legal pad on the 13″ screen so I can use it like the spiral that I carry all the time.

I gave in and got my iPhone as opposed to getting the iPod Touch – brilliant, somewhat. I love having it all together, but I have to go to airplane mode to fm transmit my ipod – which is impossible for me as a mom I can’t just turn off the phone, my kids might need me.

I do, however, love to make the little icons wiggle now – just for fun. And the google maps update is wonderful.

I used to always forget my razor phone when I left the house or would leave it places. Now with my iPhone I truly believe that I would forget a kid over forgetting the iPhone!! I am in love….
Apple TV is next on my list…

Thanks, Dave – you’ve assisted my path to whoredom with your professions of MacLove. Do you feel like a pimp?

when i saw how thin the macbook air my jaw dropped. i hate it doesn’t have an internal battery and other features you mentioned. as much as i love macs, i won’t be getting this one. i will just have to stay satisfied with my black mabook.

Done deals for me: Time Capsule. Will wait till next month to order the 1TB version, but it’s a done deal. Airport Extreme Base Station with storage. This will help in my eventual migration to Leopard.

Wait and see: The MacBook Air is very cool looking. And it’s got that flair and sass that will woo me eventually… BUT… I need to wait for the 128Gb SSD option and need to make sure that some of the limitations (most of which you mentioned) will be sufficient for my on-the-go needs. My MacBook Pro is a godsend to doing my personal projects and side work. It’s become a companion that goes with me everywhere. I would hate to need something that I do on a regular basis and only have the MacBook Air not able to perform that.

Pure want, but don’t need. As you said, Apple TV finally has some features on it that I really want. I think a lot of people were expecting a DVR, but I thought Apple did right with what they did, plus lowering the price added icing on the cake.

My only two “WTF” comments were about having to shell out an extra $20 for the new apps for existing iPod touch owners and no iTunes rentals for all previous iPod video models (only the latest models support this new feature).

The Air is an elegant machine, and I am looking forward to it appearing at my local Apple store so I can play with it, but I won’t be getting one. I’m still quite happy with my black Macbook, with its larger hard drive, faster CPU and extra ports.

If it is any consolidation, the battery for the MacBook Air is installed by apple for free when you purchase one ($129, same price as MacBook battery I believe.) When I saw the MacBook Air, I didn’t think their was many people who would need such a small computer. But then I realized that you needed one. I was disappointed that their was no new about the SDK. I really want to develop some apps for the iPhone. An “Ask Dave” app, perhaps? That widget was how I found your site in the first place.

Three months ago I spent $4,000+ on a MacBook Pro 2.4 and a 23″ Mac screen, and 500g Western Digital back up drive. I couldn’t be happier in terms of the return to Apple. The innovations that Apple has brought forward, and additional announced yesterday, are leading the tech industry and it’s all to the good for consumers.

Obviously… but millions of people shoot video for minor edits to post to YouTube and such. I’m saying iMovie here… not Final Cut Pro. It’s really stupid of Apple to ignore this ever-increasing trend on ANY machine. Personal video is the future, and I’d think the target audience for MacBook Air would be no exception.

Wow, everything is just…so…wow. *wipes away drool*
I’d be worried about breaking the Air in half, but the Time Capsule is awesome, and Apple TV certainly looks improved.
Thank you for the Mac posts, it was your review of Leopard that got me to upgrade.

The ‘Air’ looks nice but there’s no DVD drive/writer or anything. I know it’s not a deal breaker, you could lug around an external one, but that kinda ruins the sleek look of the thing doesn’t it? They should’ve put an optical drive in there somewhere.

I’m wondering how the ISP feel about the AppleTV – since I would imagine when you “download” a movie to watch you still need to download over your ISP. And I would also imagine that High Def movies will be quite large, meaning the data is flowing through your ISP – meaning potential slow downs/information jams if everyone started using this.

I’m also wondering how long it will take to get a movie, or would we need to plan hours in advance of watching a movie.

I keep thinking about when I just had to get the external floppy drive for my new iMac… only to ultimately realize that Apple was right: I didn’t need a floppy drive anymore.

So if Apple’s sayin’ it’s time to let go of the CD/DVD drive – at least on your laptop – I think they’re probably right. Apple pulls us into the future, and they almost always seem to be going the right way…

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